Reading Methods Criticized

GAINESVILLE — Poor readers result when children are not taught why they are learning to read before they actually learn how to read, a University of Florida researcher said Friday.

Education professor Elizabeth Bondy said even children from good kindergartens can be poor readers because their teachers do not have time to teach what reading is all about.

``Children have to learn first of all what this weird reading thing is all about,`` Bondy said.

``Reading should communicate meaning. But if you ask low-level readers what they think reading is, they often say it`s `saying the words` or `reading is schoolwork`,`` Bondy said.

These concepts result from the way they were taught to read, she said. The teaching techniques commonly used in primary schools -- strict phonics methods, a ``skills`` approach using beginning readers and a ``whole language`` technique employing storybooks -- also teach different attitudes toward reading.

Phonics stresses sounds of words over their meanings, Bondy said, and reading can become `saying the words`. Workbooks emphasize repetition and drill, which makes learning to read and write a chore.

The whole language approach, which Bondy advocates, teaches reading as one way we communicate with each other. A story tells something important. Children who can read for meaning are better readers, she said.

``Teachers need to give kids experience with large chunks of print. Give them a story or a poem which has more content than individual sentences do. And not just storybooks but factual books as well, because children need to learn that different kinds of books have different structures,`` Bondy said.